


Stress-Testing

by TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies), X-Men (Movies)
Genre: Darcy is a mutant, Family Issues, Gen, Magneto is Darcy's grandfather, Metalbending & Metalbenders, Metallokinesis, Mutants
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-07
Updated: 2014-03-07
Packaged: 2018-01-14 21:58:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1280254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel/pseuds/TardisIsTheOnlyWayToTravel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Darcy thinks life would be much easier if her grandfather weren't a homicidal terrorist with metal-bending powers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _Ignores comic-verse completely, so only expect to see movie-canon here. Also, I have no idea where this is going, or if I'm going to write any more of it._

The thing is, Darcy always locks her door before she leaves in the morning – _always_ – and never ever forgets, so when she comes home and her apartment door is unlocked, she slides her hand into her bag where her taser is at the same time as she starts paying hyper-attention to her surroundings.

Then she sags, because no, there isn’t a threat. It’s so much worse than that.

“Oh, crap,” Darcy says aloud.

She curls her hand around the tazer and pulls it out of her bag anyway, just on general principle, and walks into her apartment.

“You won’t need that,” says the wanted terrorist currently sitting at her kitchen table and drinking tea. For once he’s foregone the big shiny conspicuous helmet. Instead he’s dressed like his idea of a normal person, in a long sinister black overcoat with a dashing black fedora. It’s less conspicuous than the helmet and cape combo he normally wears, but only by a few degrees. Darcy thinks it makes him look like an old-fashioned mobster. _He_ probably thinks it makes him look suave, or something.

“What are you doing here?” Darcy demands.

“What, not even a hello?” Erik Lensherr drawls. Darcy glares. He shrugs a little at her reaction, and sips his tea. “I came to check on my favourite granddaughter.”

“I’m your only granddaughter,” Darcy says suspiciously. “At least, unless everyone’s been lying to me.”

Her grandfather only gives her an amused little smile that tells her absolutely nothing. Dammit. Now Darcy’s going to be wondering if she has secret relatives she doesn’t know about.

“Can’t I just live my life without you breaking into my apartment?” Darcy complains, giving in and putting the tazer back in her bag. They both know that the tazer was an empty threat, just as they both know that the only reason Darcy always has a box of tea at the back of the kitchen cupboard is because he likes to drink it. What can she say, she has a seriously misplaced affection for her problematic grandfather.

“Well, if I could convince you to visit now and again…” her grandfather says, raising an eyebrow and letting his sentence trial off pointedly.

“Gee, I wonder why I don’t do that, Mr Wanted Terrorist Who Keeps Trying To Kill Everyone.”

“Not everyone,” says her grandfather. “Only the humans.”

“I am not having this conversation with you again,” Darcy decides. “The category ‘humans’ includes people I care about. Also, you are totally endangering my job just by being here.”

“Do tell.” He gives her an inquiring look.

“I’m doing science-y things,” Darcy explains, because at this point, talking to her homicidal terrorist of a grandfather is still better than talking to her mother. What can she say, at least Magneto never told her she was useless and no boy was ever going to want her for more than a one-night stand. “Top-secret science-y things.”

“Considering that your degree was in political science, I am indeed impressed,” her grandfather opines

“Oh, shut up.” Darcy uses her mutation to fling a fork at him, which he deflects just by looking at it. He sends her a reproving look. “I’m like, a PA, or something. I don’t think I have an official job title, actually. I used to be Jane’s intern, but then all her work was seized by the men in black and she went to work for them, and when I graduated I just kind of ended up working for her full time. I’m kind of like her assistant – you know, fetching coffee, delivering reports, that sort of thing.”

“I see.” Her grandfather looks genuinely interested. “And what, exactly, are these ‘science-y things’ that you are working on?”

“Oh no.” Darcy stabs a finger at him. “I’m not telling you about what I do. You’ll reverse-engineer it and send all the humans out into space, or something – I don’t even know, something crazy. Nope. You are getting nothing out of me. My lips are sealed.” Darcy mimes zipping her lips shut, just to drive the point home.

“Very well. Do I at least get to find out who the ‘men in black’ are?” He raises an eyebrow. Darcy shrugs.

“Ever heard of an organisation called SHIELD?”

Her grandfather pauses, and looks arrested.

“I have indeed,” he says, and smiles to himself. Oh God, that’s his Plotting Something smile, Darcy hates that smile. It’s more of a smirk than anything, and also, kind of creepy.

“Yeah, well, I’m just lucky being related to you hasn’t gotten me fired yet,” says Darcy, looking at him meaningfully. “For all I know, there could be agents spying on me right now, learning about how you break into my apartment and make yourself tea.”

“Don’t worry yourself,” her grandfather recommends, ignoring the comment about breaking into her apartment and making tea. “I’m sure that if SHIELD were indeed monitoring you, they would have attempted to arrest me by now.”

“That makes me feel _so_ much better,” Darcy snarks, even though it kind of does.

There’s an awkward lull in the conversation, as Darcy’s grandfather looks inscrutable and Darcy herself wonders what it would take to Magneto-proof her life, and if she even really wants to do that, deep, deep down.

“Well, we’ve covered your current employment,” Darcy’s grandfather breaks the silence, and smirks in the way Darcy knows means he’s about to ask a question she’s not going to like. “What about your social life? Met any boys lately? Any nice young mutants, hmm?”

“Oh my God, I hate you so much,” Darcy tells him, flinging more cutlery at him. He redirects it with an air of smug serenity. “ _So much_.”  
 


	2. Chapter 2

It’s not that Darcy doesn’t know that Erik Lensherr is a reprehensible person. Of course she does. But on the other hand, knowing everything that he’s been through, and seeing the way that mutants are treated by ordinary people… it’s hard not have empathy for his position. Even knowing that he’s the reason why her entirely-human mother is so messed up (and such a terrible parent) doesn’t really help.

Because on a deep, emotional level that Darcy is ashamed to admit to, Darcy _gets_ it. Her grandfather isn’t out to play the villain: from his perspective, he’s the hero. But even if he is the villain, even if he has crossed some sort of Moral Event Horizon no one can come back from, _he doesn’t care_ , not if it saves his people. He’s willing to become a monster for the people he cares about, and part of Darcy can’t help but admire that.

The rest of her wants to scream at him until she’s hoarse, because being the victim of violence and oppression _does not entitle you to perpetuate further violence._

She knows she’s not the first person to try and have this conversation with her grandfather – he and Charles Xavier have been having it on-and-off for the last forty years or so. But Darcy doesn’t quite agree with _his_ philosophy, either – she doesn’t believe in violence, but hitting back once someone has already hit you is another thing altogether. Most people would call that self-defence.

Darcy carries a tazer everywhere she goes. She is totally down with self-defence.

Darcy’s views on mutant rights aren’t something that normally comes up in conversation, but when she overhears a conversation between Stark and Rogers, she can’t help but interrupt.

“I just don’t understand,” Rogers is saying, his expression earnest and sort of crumpled, and it’s at this point that Darcy stops to eavesdrop. “I’m held up as a hero, as an American icon, because of my abilities. But how am I different from a mutant, Tony? _Really_?”

“Well, for one, you never tried to destroy all humanity like a B-grade movie villain,” Stark snarks, all flippant judgement, and Darcy feels a surge of irrational anger.

“Hey!” she calls out, striding up to him, and she knows she’s acting aggressive and unreasonable, but right now she also doesn’t _care_. “Are you talking about Magneto?”

Both Stark and Rogers look taken-aback by Darcy’s sudden entrance into their conversation.

“Which other homicidal mutant would I be talking about?” Stark asks.

Darcy straightens, and looks him straight in the eye.

“You know he’s a survivor of the Nazi death camps right?” she snaps. “You know that he was experimented on because of his abilities?”

“Well, yeah–”

“Imagine being a _kid,_ ” Darcy barrels right over his attempt to speak, persisting with her point, “and going through those kind of horrors, and then realising that _nothing’s changed_. That your people are still being persecuted, murdered, locked away and experimented on, because they’re different. That’s enough to make a villain out of anybody.”

“Look, I didn’t say that what happened to him was _okay_ , Miss Social Justice Warrior –” Stark snaps back, on the defensive, but Darcy still isn’t about to let it go.

“Then don’t criticise what he’s doing without acknowledging why he’s doing it in the first place!” Darcy yells, throwing her hands up in the air in frustration. “If someone spends their entire life being hit, sooner or later they’re going to hit back! What do you think he’s doing?”

“Calm down,” says Stark, and Darcy glares.

“Fuck you, Stark,” she snarls. “I have every right to be angry, when people keep criticising what he’s doing without _fixing the problem_.”

“What, so you’re pro-mutant now?” Stark jibes. Darcy doesn’t hesitate.

“Hell yeah. Do I think humanity is awesome? Definitely. Do I think that the treatment of mutants is unfair and needs to change? You bet your ass I do.”

“Miss Lewis,” Rogers interrupts, his calm voice in contrast to hers and Stark’s. “He was really… experimented on?”

“He was tortured,” Darcy confirms bluntly. “In the name of science. It was sick and twisted and close to Mengele-level shit.”

Rogers' face darkens.

“I’m not saying that mutants shouldn’t be treated better!” Stark protests, in the combined face of Darcy's anger and Rogers' haunted expression. “I’m just saying that there are more constructive ways to achieve that than trying to kill everyone!”

Darcy deflates a little.

“Well, yeah. But that’s not what you were saying.”

Stark gives her a bewildered stare, and Darcy sighs, her anger suddenly gone, leaving her feeling depressed. No one ever _gets_ it. Only mutants, and no one ever listens to them.

“Never mind,” Darcy mutters, and walks away.


End file.
